CAN 2024: what you need to know about the quarter-finals
The Top 8 of African football is now known in this African Cup of Nations in Ivory Coast. The round of 16 largely reshuffled the cards, with the falls of several favorites and a drastic change of scenery compared to the previous CAN. Spotlight on the quarter-finals of this 2024 edition.
The Nigerian Semi Ajayi, the Angolan Gelson Dala, the Cape Verdean Ryan Mendes, the South African Teboho Mokoena, the Malian Lassine Sinayoko, the Ivorian Franck Kessié, the Congolese Cédric Bakambu and the Guinean Mohamed Bayo (from left to right and from top to bottom). © Sunday Alamba & Themba Hadebe, AP - RFI montage
By: Nicolas Bamba Follow
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From our special correspondent in Abidjan
,
The absence of the big names
The round of 16 of this
CAN 2024
gave rise to a real massacre of the nations announced as favorites for the coronation. Senegal, reigning African champion and author of a perfect first round? Eliminated by a resurrected Ivory Coast. Egypt, reigning African vice-champion and seven times crowned? Exit on penalties by the DRC. Morocco, semi-finalist of the last World Cup? Broken by South Africa. Three heavyweights beaten prematurely, and this is not disputed by Joseph-Antoine Bell, RFI consultant: “
No one was helped by the arbitration. No one was co-opted. It all happened on the pitch. We must accept the verdict. It is the best who qualified.
»
Read alsoCAN 2024: for the Ivory Coast coach, his team “must go to the end”
No 2022 quarter-finalists have advanced
Revolution in the
African Top 8
this year, with the qualifications of eight new teams compared to the quarter-finalists of the last CAN 2022. Two years ago, in the quarter-finals, there were: Burkina Faso-Tunisia, Senegal-Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon-Gambia and Egypt-Morocco. This year, the posters will be: Nigeria-Angola, Cape Verde-South Africa, Mali-Côte d'Ivoire and DRC-Guinea. “
The face of African football, beyond the CAN, is changing. Many teams have progressed and are playing well. The results are not due to chance
,” believes Joseph-Antoine Bell.
Four former winners against four contenders
Two years after the Holy Grail won by Senegal, will a new nation add its name to the CAN list? It is in any case always possible. The distribution of the table also gives rise to quarter-finals between ex-champions and newbies. Nigeria, with its three victories, is facing Angola, which this year equals its best historical performance by reaching the quarterfinals. Same thing for Cape Verde, which finds itself facing South Africa, crowned in 1996. Mali, unfortunate finalist in 1972, will face Ivory Coast and its two coronations. Finally, Guinea, beaten in the final in 1976, finds the DRC, twice titled.
The hegemony of sub-Saharan Africa
The eight teams present in the quarter-finals are from sub-Saharan Africa. No representative from North Africa has managed to find a place at this level, and it is not common. Since the CAN welcomes enough teams to have quarter-finals, since the 1992 edition in Senegal, it has only happened twice that the African Top 8 is played without a team from North Africa : during the 1992 CAN (Cameroon-Senegal, Ivory Coast-Zambia, Nigeria-Zaire and Ghana-Congo) and during the 2013 CAN (South Africa-Mali, Ivory Coast-Nigeria, Burkina Faso -Togo, Ghana-Cape Verde).
Read also CAN 2024 schedule and match results
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